Yeah, I went through the same thing. When selecting what type of install, there are usually categories of stuff. There was one for something like "programming environment". I thought, "I don't program; I won't be using this for programming." so I didn't select it. It would have been helpful for the installer to have the gcc packages in a separate category with a description of "needed for installing programs from source code". I eventually found something I wanted to install that didn't have a package for the distro I was on, found on the web instructions for compiling from source and tried it. No go because I apparently didn't have a compiler.
I don't mind typing a few commands at the prompt, especially if its something I know is a little unusual like compiling from source, but it bugs me when people say, "Just do./configure make make install" and then it doesn't work because they forgot to mention that you were supposed to have somehow known to install the "programming environment" because part of it is necessary to install some things. How are we supposed to know something like that?
Jeez, you should get the informative mod. I never thought about using a lack of human interaction response time for a security exploit. I like the idea of setting a delay of a couple of seconds before the response buttons become active. That would generally prevent these types of things.
You don't recall saying that windows is less user-friendly than linux? He was referring to your original statement "Are these the same people that say "Linux is too difficult to use" when all I do is..." That sounds like you said exactly what he was talking about.
Regarding your first comments: Joe User can set his virus updating and Windows updating and Ad Aware scans to run for him automatically. That makes it very easy to "install and forget", as is his goal, and it works pretty well that way. The main problem is those who don't update because it wasn't set up for auto by default and they don't know how to turn it on. You have a weird sarcastic comment that you don't seem to believe but is very accurate:
Oh, I see now. Since Windows automatic update does everything for me, I'll never have to worry about another security update again then, will I? I'll be able to forget about understanding the inner workings of my PC, I'll never need to run any security tools against my PC anymore and I can throw away my network sniffer also? Wow!!! SP2 is amazing!!!
That is pretty much true, very useful, and has nothing specifically to do with SP2. You have interesting perceptions of what is important for home users to do. You referred to "keep an eye on logfiles, install the occasional security update and make sure I understand what access points there are into my systems" as if those are trivial things that everyone knows. That's a pretty involved way of keeping your computer secure instead of having a firewall and automatic updates running.
Here where I work, they use Outlook, and until I turned it off, it had a default setting to bring up a notificatioon box when a new email came in. It was "You have new mail. Would you like to read it now?" YES | NO YES was the highlighted box, of course, so a space bar would bring up the new message instead of the email I was typing. The time I remember, though, was when I was typing, and I saw it flash on the screen for a split second and disappear. I looked at where I had just been typing and it had stolen the "n" out of one of my words to answer that dialog box.
Wait a minute. If they're "the little guys", they're not in the MPAA, and they can give out their own screener copies if they want. I hadn't heard about that decision, but it would only affect the large studios that are a part of the MPAA. The little guys can still do whatever they want to get their stuff seen since they aren't as concerned about piracy. What a crock! They had an advantage by the opportunity to get MORE exposure than the big studios, and they gave it up?
I'm thinking there may be more information to what went on than what you've said because that doesn't seem to make sense.
I really wondered about that line in the article. Isn't that what a web browser basically is? It renders HTML. How are any of the browsers, including IE different in that way?
I just read that story about the copy protection on the Velvet Revolver CD. They have a thing at the end about how to turn off Autorun to protect yourself from this. Their first step is to use the run menu and type "regedit". When I read that I was already screaming at them. What are you DOING? It's just Autorun. Go to properties for the drive and uncheck the freakin' box. Don't go telling people to mess around in the registry. Geez, I hate that, and now I know why so many Linux people complain about registry problems. It's not a config file, so don't try to treat it like one.
I find this type of scenario funny. Someone says, "Linux is so much better than Windows because $THIRD_PARTY_APP can do $ESOTERIC_FUNCTION." Huh? Almost always there's an equivalent program, or even as in this case, the same program that can do that on Windows.
So what the heck is his problem? I ordered the free bulk update CD from MS because I knew that would be a problem. I get it installed and use the update CD before I put it on the network. Or, your other opportunity is to have Zone Alarm on a disc so you can install that before you put it on the network.
This is the most insightful comment I've seen in this thread, but it needs more moderation. I was browsing at 3, and only saw it because the original comment was so ignorant I was about to reply to him. I checked the replies under my threshold, and it looks like this AC already took care of it.
I find it a useless argument when people say things like, "Windows doesn't come with any good software. This 6-disc _______ Linux distro comes with all the software you could ever want." I think I would rather have the OS on one disc and have one other disc of the free (beer or speech) software that I want burned on a CD-R that I made. I'll take my Windows with Filezilla, CD-DA X-Tractor, Firefox, ZoneAlarm, Ad Aware, etc.
Except that doesn't apply here. Third party software running on Windows is not part of the Windows OS.
So? GNU utilities ported to the linux kernel are not part of the linux kernel either.
The original claim was that linux was a better PLATFORM, not a better OS, and if you can combine the base windows OS with the GNU tools to make a perfectly acceptable platform, then that is something to consider. Once you factor in all the freely available tools that AREN'T GNU, it didn't even come close to a valid point.
I'm doing my civic duty by quoting this guy. He was an AC that made a point that needs to be heard and got modded down with Overrated. I'll put my Karma Bonus on the Slashdot altar to give him a voice. Here's to you, Mr. Anonymous posting guy.
The idiom refers to boxing, where in crooked matches a boxer (often a "palooka," a no-name challenger hyped as being equal to or better than the champion) is bribed with the understanding that he will agree to be knocked out, i.e. dive for the canvas.
Thanks for generally informing people about the phrase, but I'll supply a little correction so it makes more sense. Usually the heavily favored well-known boxer is the one paid to take a dive because the betting odds of the fight are in his favor. Whoever finances the "fixing" of the match has bet heavily on the underdog, so they can make a ton of money from it and shares some of the gain with the guy who agreed to go down.
That's like saying this three foot long clue-bat to hit them with is "cookie-sized" because two of its dimensions are about the same as two of the cookie's dimensions. Shouldn't they approximately match all three dimensions to claim that?
That was/is one of my favorite games of all time. My team was Buffalo, so I also had to suffer the indignity of seeing "QB Bills" throw my touchdown passes.
We know that statistic is bogus, but you know why they promote that so much? Camcorder-recorded versions are out of their control, so they can very reasonably throw all the blame on the person who is caught doing it. What they don't want to admit is that they are partially responsible for the good DVD copies that actually do sell. The DVD screener copies they give out to get their movies rated are what leads to most of this piracy. If they wanted to enforce non-piracy, they would restrict rating showings to actual private theater showings, where they invite the critics and set up some real security to prevent anyone from taking a copy out with them. Really there is no need for them to send screeners out, and that is their own fault, but they don't want people to know that.
I'm glad you haven't been modded up yet. You quote one line from the article, make a false assumption and apparently didn't read the VERY NEXT SENTENCE, which disproved what you ranted about. Let me quote those two sentences here with emphasis on the part you seem to have missed.
Under the settlement, Microsoft will give half the value of any unclaimed vouchers to Massachusetts' public schools. Those vouchers may be used to buy
hardware, Microsoft software and non-Microsoft software, and professional development services.
Can we also look at this paragraph above that?
Qualifying Massachusetts consumers will receive vouchers used to buy
any manufacturer's desktop, laptop and tablet computers; any software available for sale to the public and used with those products; and specified accessories for use with computers.
So these vouchers, claimed or unclaimed, can be used to buy barebones systems with no OS installed, or even PC's pre-installed with Linux? How about that? And it only took a little R'ing of TFA to find that out.
Yeah, I got my wife using Firefox 0.8. It sounds like 0.9 introduced too many bugs, so I'm glad I'm sticking with 0.8. I set it up on someone else's computer too, who really knows nothing about it. I removed the icons for IE, and changed a couple of default behaviors for them. The one that got me was that Firefox has a default folder for downloads and doesn't indicate where that is or prompt you about it. I had to change that to ask the user where to save it to so they would know what the heck was going on and wouldn't complain about it being "broken". I think that's a pretty dumb default setting. If someone wants to set a default folder for all downloads, let them do it in the options, but I download different types of things and don't want them all dumping in the same place.
Slashdot Mirror
Yeah, I went through the same thing. When selecting what type of install, there are usually categories of stuff. There was one for something like "programming environment". I thought, "I don't program; I won't be using this for programming." so I didn't select it. It would have been helpful for the installer to have the gcc packages in a separate category with a description of "needed for installing programs from source code". I eventually found something I wanted to install that didn't have a package for the distro I was on, found on the web instructions for compiling from source and tried it. No go because I apparently didn't have a compiler.
./configure make make install" and then it doesn't work because they forgot to mention that you were supposed to have somehow known to install the "programming environment" because part of it is necessary to install some things. How are we supposed to know something like that?
I don't mind typing a few commands at the prompt, especially if its something I know is a little unusual like compiling from source, but it bugs me when people say, "Just do
Jeez, you should get the informative mod. I never thought about using a lack of human interaction response time for a security exploit. I like the idea of setting a delay of a couple of seconds before the response buttons become active. That would generally prevent these types of things.
Regarding your first comments: Joe User can set his virus updating and Windows updating and Ad Aware scans to run for him automatically. That makes it very easy to "install and forget", as is his goal, and it works pretty well that way. The main problem is those who don't update because it wasn't set up for auto by default and they don't know how to turn it on.
You have a weird sarcastic comment that you don't seem to believe but is very accurate:That is pretty much true, very useful, and has nothing specifically to do with SP2.
You have interesting perceptions of what is important for home users to do. You referred to "keep an eye on logfiles, install the occasional security update and make sure I understand what access points there are into my systems" as if those are trivial things that everyone knows. That's a pretty involved way of keeping your computer secure instead of having a firewall and automatic updates running.
Here where I work, they use Outlook, and until I turned it off, it had a default setting to bring up a notificatioon box when a new email came in. It was "You have new mail. Would you like to read it now?" YES | NO
YES was the highlighted box, of course, so a space bar would bring up the new message instead of the email I was typing. The time I remember, though, was when I was typing, and I saw it flash on the screen for a split second and disappear. I looked at where I had just been typing and it had stolen the "n" out of one of my words to answer that dialog box.
Hmm, I'm just impressed that you quote C.S. Lewis in your sig.
Wait a minute. If they're "the little guys", they're not in the MPAA, and they can give out their own screener copies if they want. I hadn't heard about that decision, but it would only affect the large studios that are a part of the MPAA. The little guys can still do whatever they want to get their stuff seen since they aren't as concerned about piracy. What a crock! They had an advantage by the opportunity to get MORE exposure than the big studios, and they gave it up?
I'm thinking there may be more information to what went on than what you've said because that doesn't seem to make sense.
I really wondered about that line in the article. Isn't that what a web browser basically is? It renders HTML. How are any of the browsers, including IE different in that way?
I just read that story about the copy protection on the Velvet Revolver CD. They have a thing at the end about how to turn off Autorun to protect yourself from this. Their first step is to use the run menu and type "regedit". When I read that I was already screaming at them. What are you DOING? It's just Autorun. Go to properties for the drive and uncheck the freakin' box. Don't go telling people to mess around in the registry. Geez, I hate that, and now I know why so many Linux people complain about registry problems. It's not a config file, so don't try to treat it like one.
I find this type of scenario funny. Someone says, "Linux is so much better than Windows because $THIRD_PARTY_APP can do $ESOTERIC_FUNCTION." Huh? Almost always there's an equivalent program, or even as in this case, the same program that can do that on Windows.
So what the heck is his problem? I ordered the free bulk update CD from MS because I knew that would be a problem. I get it installed and use the update CD before I put it on the network. Or, your other opportunity is to have Zone Alarm on a disc so you can install that before you put it on the network.
This is the most insightful comment I've seen in this thread, but it needs more moderation. I was browsing at 3, and only saw it because the original comment was so ignorant I was about to reply to him. I checked the replies under my threshold, and it looks like this AC already took care of it.
I find it a useless argument when people say things like, "Windows doesn't come with any good software. This 6-disc _______ Linux distro comes with all the software you could ever want." I think I would rather have the OS on one disc and have one other disc of the free (beer or speech) software that I want burned on a CD-R that I made. I'll take my Windows with Filezilla, CD-DA X-Tractor, Firefox, ZoneAlarm, Ad Aware, etc.
You missed the right kind of formatting of this concept.
1. Declare there are WMDs.
2. Fail to find WMDs.
3. Reclassify common item as a WMD.
4. Declare you have found the WMDs!
5. ???
6. Political profit!
That's like saying this three foot long clue-bat to hit them with is "cookie-sized" because two of its dimensions are about the same as two of the cookie's dimensions. Shouldn't they approximately match all three dimensions to claim that?
Wow, that's a great suggestion. I think that's the best idea I've heard all week. Well, that and moving my home PC to Gentoo.
That was/is one of my favorite games of all time. My team was Buffalo, so I also had to suffer the indignity of seeing "QB Bills" throw my touchdown passes.
We know that statistic is bogus, but you know why they promote that so much? Camcorder-recorded versions are out of their control, so they can very reasonably throw all the blame on the person who is caught doing it. What they don't want to admit is that they are partially responsible for the good DVD copies that actually do sell. The DVD screener copies they give out to get their movies rated are what leads to most of this piracy. If they wanted to enforce non-piracy, they would restrict rating showings to actual private theater showings, where they invite the critics and set up some real security to prevent anyone from taking a copy out with them. Really there is no need for them to send screeners out, and that is their own fault, but they don't want people to know that.
Can I take their scalps like a real bounty hunter?
Quit wasting time filing lawsuits and GET BACK TO WORK!
Dude, you just posted it on /. There goes your obscurity.
Yeah, I got my wife using Firefox 0.8. It sounds like 0.9 introduced too many bugs, so I'm glad I'm sticking with 0.8. I set it up on someone else's computer too, who really knows nothing about it. I removed the icons for IE, and changed a couple of default behaviors for them. The one that got me was that Firefox has a default folder for downloads and doesn't indicate where that is or prompt you about it. I had to change that to ask the user where to save it to so they would know what the heck was going on and wouldn't complain about it being "broken". I think that's a pretty dumb default setting. If someone wants to set a default folder for all downloads, let them do it in the options, but I download different types of things and don't want them all dumping in the same place.